Hungary Grand Prix – Race Results: P2

Lewis Hamilton claimed his first victory for Mercedes with an imperious drive in the Hungarian Grand Prix.

The Briton pulled himself clear of a fraught race behind, in which Kimi Raikkonen ultimately beat Sebastian Vettel to second, Mark Webber salvaged fourth and Romain Grosjean’s chances were spoiled by a penalty.

Raikkonen worked his way forward on a two-stop strategy, spending the early part of the race trapped behind Massa before bringing himself into contention.

Kimi Raikkonen – 2nd: “It was a good race and a good result for the team. The strategy worked well. We did two long stints on the tyres but they weren’t too bad and the car felt strong so it allowed us to make one less stop. In the last few laps the rears were a bit on edge, but apart from that it was OK. Sebastian [Vettel] got the run on me a couple of times but luckily it was in places that you can’t really overtake. The main positive is that we gained a few points to Seb in the championship. For sure we could have maybe closed the gap a little more with a win, but anything we can get back will help. We’re only halfway through the season and it will be hard to catch up, but anything can still happen so we’ll keep fighting until the end.”

Romain Grosjean – 6th: “For sure this is one that got away, but I’m very happy with my race and I honestly don’t think I could have done much more. Maybe the strategy didn’t quite work how we wanted, but the car felt really good and it was the traffic that cost us. Without this maybe there would never have been a drive-through penalty which for sure didn’t help. I haven’t seen the footage yet and I thought it was a good move, but unfortunately the stewards took a different view. I’ve no problem with the time-added for the incident with Jenson and I apologised to him afterwards. This could have been the one for me, but we will just have to wait a little bit longer and keep improving like we have been recently to make it happen.”

Eric Boullier, team principal: “Another good result for Kimi today. He drove very well and was backed up by a strong strategy to help him make the podium. Romain was very unfortunate in that we couldn’t quite jump Fernando [Alonso] in the pits which cost him a lot of time, plus the drive-through penalty cost him a far better result. He made a great move at a circuit where overtaking is difficult and he had no room to do anything else. For us the Stewards’ decision was harsh. The most important thing to take from the weekend has been the pace of the car; this circuit is a bit special, and I think there will be some circuits where we have to work a bit harder, but I’m confident we’ll be consistently fighting for podiums at every race weekend in the second half of the season. Red Bull are a long way ahead, but we’ve shown today that they can be beaten so we want to keep pushing them all the way.”

Alan Permane, trackside operations director: “It was a great race today from Kimi – as always. We started the race intending a three-stop strategy, but as the race played out it became clear that a two-stop would give us better possibilities so we switched over to that strategy. Kimi drove superbly to look after his tyres but deliver exactly the pace we needed at the appropriate time. He was rewarded by returning to second in the drivers’ championship. I feel really sorry for Romain for what appears to be a very harsh penalty for a fantastic overtaking move on Felipe Massa. Yes, he ran off the track, but he had nowhere else to go. It certainly seemed like good racing to me; were it not for the drive-through penalty, we would have had two cars on the podium again.”

Published by Evenstar Saima

4 thoughts on “Hungary Grand Prix – Race Results: P2”

Nice result if we consider the gap between Kimi and the leaders after the first stint but Kimi could have easily won that race with a better qualifying, quite disappointed, a win would have been awesome especially for the fans in front of the podium cheering his name. Hats off Lewis, great drive and he deserved it. At least, Kimi gets back his second place in the drivers’ standing.

Yeah it was not easy yesterday to see him struggling that much with the car and constantly 5 tenths behind Grosjean plus hearing the comments of JV. Hope there’s a good shot in Spa but the E21 wont be the favourite there. kinda fed up with 2nd place, he has too many in his careers. Still disappointed, i was too confident before the weekend:(